Daniel Orton

When you think of the Boston Celtics, you think about Larry Bird, Bill Russell, Red Auerbach, the Big Three of 2008, “now there’s a steal by Bird underneath to DJ he lays it in,” eight-straight titles, 17 overall, etc. Somewhere way down on the list, way way below Kevin McHale, John Havlicek, Reggie Lewis, and even Antoine Walker and Dominique Wilkins (yep, he led the C’s in scoring in 1994-1995), you think of Big Goofy White Guys.

So while most of Boston cursed Danny Ainge for shipping Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce to Brooklyn for three number one picks and a pile of garbage that included Kris Humphries, the move made complete sense to me. Except for two inflated seasons for a worthless New Jersey Nets team, Humphries is the protypical big white man at the end of the bench that has become a symbol of Boston basketball pride.

All hail Trey Burke! May all the inhabitants of the great Salt Lake City and all their respective wives rejoice! And… the Jazz are still atrocious. Poor Tyrone Corbin. He’s got to fiddle with Burke, Alec Burks, John Lucas III and now Diante Garrett at the point. Jerry Sloan got John Stockton. Then Deron Williams. It just ain’t fair! In yet another Jazz loss moving them down to 1-12, Burke got 12 minutes even, going 11/1/1 with a steal and hitting a trey shooting 5-8. Trey with the trey! If only Deuce McAllister was an NBA player. Deuce with the deuce! Or if McAllister was a dunker, “Deuce with the upper decker!” I had the unfortunate pleasure of doing highlights for my second Jazz game now, but it was cool to see Burke’s debut and I thought he looked pretty good. His first NBA points were off a long rebound then coast-to-coast for a controlled, attacking floater. Obviously he’s getting eased in and he’ll get more minutes – hippity-skippity to a few months back and I was bigger on Burke than anyone – but I’m not ready to go nuts and drop quality guys for him. Of course it’s a case-by-case scenario, but I really wanted Burke to get tons of preseason work; instead he broke his finger and missed some really crucial development time. For example, I think I’m still holding Patrick Beverley over him. PBev is the Razzball “why can’t I quit you?!” fantasy asset. Lucas III is obviously not a long-term solution, and while he’s in the mix, he didn’t look good last night but was the only guy that could hit any long balls. Alec Burks looked awful, sure his line 8/1/1/1/2 is fine, shot 3-6 – fine – but racked up 4 TOs in 16 minutes. Just looked bad. Which brings me to Diante G, who I thought looked really good. Garrett actually led the Jazz in PG minutes with 20, and racked up a 4/1/6 line with three steals and only 2 TOs (one late one was pretty bad, but the game was over) and played down the stretch. Garrett was the only point who could create opportunities. So it’s a little crowded with Burks’ potential wilting away and Garrett looking decent as a D-League gamble and could get run through the season. I think Lucas III gets cut at some point and Burks plays strictly backup 2 minutes, but that’s just me. It’s a mess. Shocker, considering it’s the Jazz! Here’s what else I saw last night:

Well, here we are fantasy baskethoopers (<– my mentally ill uncle’s term, often sputtered out in between foul-language rants about the garbage man); the final day of your fantasy basketball season (unless you’re in a playoff format in which you did not make the finals.

Telling you to go full throttle on Marvin Williams is like telling you to go rent “Charlie’s Angels 2: Full Throttle” on Netflix. Both are stuff from the mid-2000s, both will excite you for a second but ultimately leave you feeling shallow and empty for even that momentary excitement, and both leave one wishing it had more Bill Murray.

In case you have been living under a rock, or already lost your playoff matchup and moved on to baseball, LaMarcus Aldridge is undergoing season-ending surgery for a labral tear in his hip. Labral tear? I thought only women could have those.